Progressive House Members Express Displeasure with Proposed Border Deal

Liberal Democrats in Congress are lining up against the proposed supplemental bill being negotiated in the Senate because its immigration changes are too harsh, The Hill reported.

Senate negotiators have been working legislation that would send military aid to Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan in exchange for tougher southern border policies.

Sen. James Lankford, R-Okla., one of the key negotiators, told reporters Wednesday that “we’re hoping to get it out this week.”

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told House Republican conference members last week that what he’s heard about the Senate deal would make it “dead on arrival” in the lower chamber.

The speaker is being supported by conservatives, who say President Joe Biden has the power to end the migrant crisis through executive actions and without congressional intervention.

Now, progressive Democrats also are upset at what they’ve learned from numerous media reports outlining some of the border changes allegedly in the bill.

Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) and the Progressive Caucus are among those members angry that they’ve been left out of the Senate negotiations, The Hill reported.

“It’s been a major problem, and I also think it’s going to pose a major obstacle to having the Hispanic Caucus approve any deal that’s coming out,” Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., said, The Hill reported.

“The problem is with the policy [and] the problem is with the process, in not having any CHC members deeply involved in this.”

House progressives are furious that the proposed deal excludes protections for asylum-seekers and a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants already in the country.

“Everything that I’ve heard that’s in this bill is going to set immigration reform — real comprehensive immigration reform — back 10 or 15 years,” said Rep. Nanette Barragán, D-Calif., the head of the Hispanic Caucus, The Hill reported.

“If there was something in there like pathways [to citizenship] or Dreamers, that would be a very different conversation. But there was no negotiation. It was really a hostage-taking, and saying, ‘OK, what more do you want?’ And it was mostly concessions on things that there’s evidence is not going to fix the problem.”

With Biden, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and other Democrats blaming former President Donald Trump and his supporters for potentially killing a bipartisan border agreement, the growing number of progressive critics could be a headache for the party.

“The things that are in the bill that were negotiated are things that are Trumpian kind of policies that have never worked to actually address the issues that we have,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., head of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, The Hill reported.

“So I’m disappointed, frankly, that the president, the White House and some other Democrats are giving in to that kind of narrative, because it undermines what we really do need to do that would fix the problem.”